


Let's (Not) Try This Again

by twofoldAxiom



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Abuse, Dream Bubbles (Homestuck), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Past Abuse, Physical Abuse, Psychological Horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-25
Updated: 2020-04-25
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:08:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23845741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twofoldAxiom/pseuds/twofoldAxiom
Summary: Dave's memory of a rooftop in Houston comes to life.
Relationships: Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas
Comments: 12
Kudos: 149
Collections: April 2020 - Titles I'll Never Use





	Let's (Not) Try This Again

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the DaveKat Thirst Federation's ideas. Written in thirty minutes so like, hell yeah? Short, sweet, and to the point.
> 
> Special thanks to retrorabbit, soleil, alldavekat, and theyoungphoenix for chatting up a storm and basically plotting this whole thing lol.
> 
> Title courtesy of turntechClockwork.

Your name is Dave Strider and you're not afraid.

You're fifteen years old and you know Bro's hard on you, sure, but this is the first time he's asked you to come up to the roof with a note and something about it fills you with an unknowable, bloodless cold in your guts. You bring one of your swords just in case- the roof means a strife, and a strife means a sword- but every step up the stairs feels endless and slow.

The sun's high overhead and the concrete is so blisteringly hot you see heatwaves rising off the edges of the building. There's wind, but it's dry, unforgiving wind, like a blowdryer without the buzz. Crows strut around your feet as you step out onto the roof. Bro is nowhere to be seen.

You're _not_ afraid.

You turn the grip of your sword in your fingers, swinging it in lazy arcs over your hand as you take another step, and your only warning is the scrape of rubber on the roofing behind you before you have to turn around and parry a much larger, much heavier sword coming down on you from above. Metal shrieks against metal, and he's bearing down on you with enough force to bring you to your knees.

_You're not afraid._

The pressure leaves and you roll to the side, feel the rush of air where Bro's blade just barely misses your cheek. Back on your feet, breath coming hot and tight in your throat. You parry again and he's gone, and then his shin makes contact with your side, sending you skidding across the ground.

"Bro-!"

The second one gets you in the back, knocking the rest of the air out of your lungs. You hear a pop as you impact the ground again, and you look down and see your shitty piece of shit sword in two pieces. You see his reflection stalking closer in half the blade. You're on your feet.

You parry and sparks fly. Your arms shake.

"What the fuck-!"

"Too slow."

How the fuck did you get upside-down? Oh, you're falling. You hit the ground again, on your back this time, and you jump up just fast enough to avoid the point of his blade arcing across the concrete where your arm had been. The gouge it leaves behind makes your eyes widen. There's a smear of red there, too- oh, that's from your arm. You weren't fast enough after all.

_You're not afraid. Dave Strider isn't afraid. You look death in the face and tell it to get bent._

_You're not afraid._ You tell yourself that, gritting your teeth, blood slipping down your fingers on the blade handle, but it hurts and your knees are shaking, your vision tunneling. It hurts and there's so much red, it stinks like rust and pennies and butcher shops-

You're shoved forward, then back, a knee to the gut. The blade barely misses your nose. A sliver of hair floats away from you.

_Well, I needed a haircut, right?_

You crumple to your knees and think, you're too slow, this happens every time. He's going to take a swing at your face next and-

_He didn't do that, did he?_

You hear him coming, you know he's letting you hear it. When the footsteps stop, when his shadow looms over you, you look up to see him blocking out the sun.

_That's not right, either._

You stand, gasping from the pain. You close your fingers around the handle of the sword again and watch his edges ripple with afterimages, colors bleeding into each other-

Metal shrieks against metal, but it sounds heavier this time. The blade is wrenched to the side- not by you, by this, this _monster_ , he just came out of nowhere, but-

You know him, he's here to save you, God, but who is he, what is he; he's-

"That's new."

Bro recovers too fast for that kind of thing. He tilts his hat, rearranges his shades, and you think no, no, this isn't how it goes down, this _shouldn't be happening,_ but it happens in front of you anyway and you're not going anywhere, you're rooted to the spot as this blot of night in person shape snarls and claws at Bro, but he's too slow too, he's not _made_ for this.

But he tries for you, it's for you, you know it in your blood and bones and the crowns of your teeth and the tears in your eyes, _it's for you_ , and when Bro comes back for you, when Karkat's lying there in a pool of red-

_You're afraid._

_You're afraid._

_You're so fucking afraid, there's tears streaming down your face and it's-_

_This is-_

_This isn't how it happened._

_This isn't fucking real._

~!~

You wake up, shivering, lying on your back and staring at the ceiling of the common room in the meteor. You're lying on the couch and just fucking tangled up in your cape, and you're whole and unharmed, and-

Karkat, where's Karkat, he's-

"Dave, hey, breathe."

"Fuck!" You jump off the couch and roll, but with your cape making a mess of everything you just end up tangled even further and kicking it around like an idiot. Karkat grabs your wrists and fucking sits on you like you're a child, purring and clicking like a combination cat and dolphin, and you can't take it, he nuzzles your cheek and he's warm and alive and _real_.

"I'm okay. It was a fucking dreambubble, I'm sorry I didn't think- holy shit, Dave, _that's_ what you grew up with?" He looks as grumpy as ever, but he lets go of your wrists and doesn't complain when you pat his cheeks and horns and hair, though he blushes as you just hold his face in your hands, shaking all over.

"You died." You mutter, when you can finally speak. There is absolutely no chance of you looking cool right now, but there's nobody else here and you just saw your b- your bro, Karkat, your one friend who isn't immortal like the rest of you, at least not that anyone fucking knows- you just saw him die and it's still seared into your eyes.

"It was a dream." He says, still clicking, still filling your head with those subsonic rumbles in the back of his voice that should scare you but only remind you that you're holding him, warm and alive and in the distant, impossible space between realities where dreams come to fucking haunt you. "I- well- I _did_ die, but only in a dream. That was... really stupid of me, actually; I don't know why I thought that was going to do anything."

He says it so awkwardly, so sincerely, so tenderly. You can't help it. 

You laugh. 

You laugh, and you cry, tears running down your face and hiccups messing up your words when you try to say them, and he rolls his eyes, but he lets you hold him and he strokes your hair.

"I was fucking scared, man." You sob, quietly, like, if anyone's recording this or walking in on this your reputation is never going to recover, but you trust that he won't bring this up. That'd be low, too low, for a guy who just threw himself in front of a sword for someone he didn't remember. Fucking dreambubbles. "I was terrified."

"It's okay." He says, as he wraps the two of you in your cape, purring away as he curls around you warm and safe. "It's okay."

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [i've got this sentimental heart that beats](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23846896) by [aceAdoxography](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aceAdoxography/pseuds/aceAdoxography)




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